


One for the Road

by rosehips



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Bickering, Car Singing, F/M, Fluff, I can't believe I wrote this much fluff, Road Trip, SO MUCH FLUFF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-12 15:09:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12962109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosehips/pseuds/rosehips
Summary: Driving six hours to a maximum security prison isn't anyone's idea of fun, but good company can make up for anything.





	One for the Road

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is inspired this tweet: https://twitter.com/wolfrmadden/status/938215218898903041
> 
> It also exists thanks to Eli (@oliviarafaels on twitter), who is a Barson genius and the most enthusiastic wonderful beta. He is also responsible for the choice of song in this fic.

It’s a nearly six-hour drive to Attica, so Olivia picks up Rafael at 6am. She’s surprised at how chipper he is until he explains that he’s already had two cups of coffee and is a quarter of the way through the enormous thermos he’s carrying.

“How was your morning?” he asks as they head towards the Holland Tunnel.

“Oh, it was alright. Lucy was a godsend and she’s staying with Noah all day.” Olivia hesitates.

“Mm,” he says as he sips his coffee; his version of “go on.”

“I woke him up before I left. I just… we’re going to get back so late, and I wasn’t going to see him all day. I should have let him sleep but I woke him up so I could say bye.” She shakes her head ruefully. “That was selfish of me.”

“Liv, please,” he says. “Kids that age, they go back to sleep like that.” He snaps his fingers. “And I’m sure he was happy you woke him. He got to say bye to you too.”

This puts a small smile on her face. “Since when are you an expert on this?”

“Well, _I_ like seeing you even if it’s so early it’s still dark out, so I figure your own son probably does too.”

“Flatterer.”

“I would never.”

She chuckles.

“Anyway,” he sighs, “have you thought about how we’re gonna get this son of a bitch to tell us where he put those bodies? Because I have, and I’ve got two ideas and I don’t like either of them. It’s like Gregory Yates all over again.”

“You got Yates put away,” she reminds him.

He smirks. “That I did. But it took Rollins how many trips to Green Haven to get the locations out of him? I do _not_ want to make this trip more than once.”

“That makes two of us.” She ponders his question. “I have a few ideas too. Let me hear yours first.”

They spend the first hour of the drive this way, brainstorming until they’ve got a strategy that plays to both their strengths and everything they know about the con’s weaknesses.

“We make a good team,” Rafael comments once the plan is down solid. “As long as there’s no drones-and-riot situation again -- which, what _is_ it about Greenhaven? I still don’t understand how that warden still has her job, it’s _egregious_ \-- anyway, as long as _that_ doesn’t happen again, we should be fine.”

“Don’t raise your hopes too high,” she advises, though privately she agrees.

He raises an amused eyebrow. “About getting him to talk, or about there not being a riot?”

“Both,” she says with mock severity.

“You sure you don’t want to turn the car around, send Rollins and Carisi instead?” he jokes.

“This guy needs a Lieutenant and a lawyer,” she states, back to seriousness. “An ADA,” she corrects herself before Rafael can point out that Carisi technically _is_ a lawyer, if not a practicing one.

“I know,” he sighs, rubbing his eyes. “I just wish he didn’t need them 350 miles from New York.”

“Unhappy with your company?” she teases.

Rafael doesn’t bother to tease back, simply shakes his head and says “Not at all.”

After a few minutes of pleasant silence, he leans forward and starts to fiddle with the media player.

 _\--HOT POTATO, HOT POTATO_ , a man’s voice blares out, so loudly that Rafael jumps. _POTATO, POTATO, POTATO_.

He mutes the speakers and turns to stare at Olivia. She’s already laughing.

“It’s the Wiggles,” she explains, trying not to laugh harder at the look on his face. “Noah loves them, so I got the CD.”

“Does Noah also love to have his eardrums blown out?” Rafael asks, voice dripping with amused sarcasm.

“You probably turned the volume up before you hit play without realizing it.”

“I did not.”

She raises an eyebrow. “Now who sounds like a child?”

He huffs slightly before turning to her again. “Are all the lyrics just… ‘potato’?”

She slows the car as a van merges ahead of them. “Do you want to listen to the rest and find out?”

“I most decidedly do not,” he replies. “Don’t you get sick of it?”

She chuckles. “Yep. Especially when the songs get stuck in my head. I know all the words by now, too.”

“I’m so sorry,” he deadpans, then turns to the media player again. This time he makes sure to turn the volume knob down before un-muting.

 _Mashed banana, mashed banana,_ the voices sing out before Rafael switches to the radio.

“Any preferences when it comes to real music?” he asks as he tunes through the stations.

Olivia shakes her head. “I’ll let you know if I hear something I like. Or dislike.”

Picky as always, it takes Rafael a while to decide. He pauses on each station for a snippet of song before moving on, through Top 40 ( _baby you light up my world like nobody else, the way that you flip your hair--_ ), rap ( _I’m so reckless when I rock my Givenchy dress…_ ), indie ( _my broken house behind me and good things ahead_ ), alternative ( _started out with a kiss, how did it end up like this?_ ), and outlaw country ( _rhinestone suits and new shiny cars; where do we take it from here?_ ). And bluegrass (incomprehensibly fast fiddling). And classic country (some man yodeling something about throwing himself in a river). And --

“I’m sorry, are you driving in the right direction, or have we crossed the Mason-Dixon line?” he demands of Olivia as the next station reveals itself as modern country ( _‘cause Earl had to die, na na-na-na naa..._ ). He jabs at the button three or four more times as if it is personally responsible for the music, and, after skipping quickly over various commercials, _finally_ settles on a station playing Elvis.

“Took you long enough,” she comments with a raised eyebrow. _A hard-headed woman, a soft-hearted man,_ Elvis declares as she speaks, _been the cause of trouble ever since the world began._ “Oldies? Really?”

“Would you like to go back to…” he struggles to think of the name of any country artist. “Carrie Underwood? Or whoever that was?”

She laughs. “No, this is fine. I’m just teasing you.” She glances over to see that he looks oddly pleased by this comment.

_Well I got a woman, head like a rock, if she ever went away I’d cry around the clock, oh-ho yeah, ever --_

“What kind of music _do_ you like?” he asks again.

“The Wiggles,” she deadpans, and he snorts. “No, I like oldies too.” She pauses.

“Don’t laugh,” she warns, and he turns with a grin, prepared to do just that. “I really liked Grease _._ The music, but the movie too. My friend and I even went as two of the Pink Ladies for Halloween one year.”

“A what?”

She glances over at him. “A Pink Lady. You’ve never seen Grease?”

“Can’t say that I have,” he says haughtily.

“But you love musicals.”

“I love _Broadway,_ ” he corrects her. “The movie Grease is not Broadway.”

She shakes her head with a smile. “You can be such a snob, Rafa.”

“I think I’ve earned the right,” he replies, sounding far too smug about it.

“Anyway,” Olivia says, keeping one hand on the wheel while she points a finger towards him with the other, “we’re watching Grease at some point.”

“Oh we are, are we?”

“Yes.”

“May I drink?”

She sighs. “Not to the point that you don’t get to remember any of it.”

“ _Have_ to,” he corrects, but under his breath, so she lets it go with a smile.

They fall back into companionable silence and spend several long miles this way, radio low as he gazes out the window and she, no longer in any rush, stays in the middle lane and lets cars pass by.

A slower song comes on, one that sounds familiar. _Here’s my story, it’s sad but true…_ It must be familiar to Rafael too, because she notices he’s begun to hum along. _It’s about a girl that I once knew…_

“Is this --” she snaps her fingers, trying to remember. “I know this one. I like this one.”

“Me too,” Rafael grins.

The song speeds up as the background singers begin to _hey -- hey --_ and the lead vocalizes. And Rafael’s still going, a little louder now even. She risks taking her eyes of the road for a long moment to look at him, and his smile.

“You have a nice voice,” she comments, facing forward again and beginning to hum along herself. What can she say? His smile is contagious. And it’s a catchy song.

Especially when it picks up, and suddenly he’s _really_ singing: _Wooah, yeah I should have known it from the very start; this girl will leave me with a broken heart, now listen people what I’m telling you: uh-keep away from a-Runaround Sue!_

Olivia was wrong. He doesn’t have a nice voice. He has a _great_ voice. She won’t say so; she doesn’t want to stroke his ego _too_ much, plus she doesn’t want to interrupt. She decides to stay in her range and play background singer, tapping her hands against the wheel in time with the snapping fingers on the radio, and if this means she’s kind of dancing a little, that’s fine.

(She’ll never admit it to anyone besides Noah, who already knows, but she actually car dances a lot. To the Wiggles. But Noah loves it, and really, so does she.)

Her thoughts stop dead in their tracks when they get to the bridge of the song, because _oh my God._ Rafael is _belting_ it out: “She likes to travel around, yeah,” he sings; “she’ll love you and she’ll put you down.”

Still singing, he turns to grin at her; he knows _exactly_ how good she is and she’s amazed he’s never shown off about this before.

“Oh people let me put you wise,” he continues, and then his voice drops theatrically -- “uh-Sue _go_ -oes out with other guys,” and then he has to stop because he’s laughing outright at the look on her face, and maybe, maybe, she thinks, out of simple happiness.

“What’s wrong, you don’t sing?” he asks, a little breathless.

“Not like you do!” she says, still incredulous at the sound of his voice.

“Come on,” he smirks. “Song’s almost over.”

She can feel herself blushing. “I have a terrible voice, so you’re going to regret this,” she tells him, and then gives it a try: “Here’s the moral of the story from the guy who knows -- _stop laughing_ \-- I fell in love and the love still grows -- Rafael, I swear if you don’t -- ask any fool that she ever knew, they’ll say --”

He finally decides to be merciful, and joins in for the last few lines: “Stay away from that girl, don’t you know what she’ll do now, stay away from Sue!” and then it’s done, and they’re both laughing so hard she almost has to pull over the car.

“Oh,” she sighs, wiping her eyes, “I needed that.”

She can feel his gaze on her, and when she glances over she can’t tell whether he’s really thinking or whether his expression is that of mock pensiveness, because she has to look back at the road too quickly. “What?”

“You weren’t lying. You really do have a terrible voice,” he says thoughtfully.

Olivia slaps at his arm but she’s laughing again, and can’t help but look at him again too, and this time… he’s so relaxed, leaning back against the headrest, face flushed from song and laughter, and his _eyes_. He’s looking at her with such soft, sweet fondness that her heart clenches and she has to turn back to the road.

“Shit,” she says suddenly.

Rafael lifts his head. “What is it?”

“Tank’s nearly empty. When’s the next rest stop?”

He digs his phone out of his pocket (he hasn’t even looked at it since they left the city, she realizes, and she’s not sure why that does funny things to her heart too) and he checks the map.

“Two miles,” he tells her. “Exit 72.”

They pull off into Binghamton, New York, and stop at the first gas station they see. There’s no fast food around, only the little shop at the station.

“I’m gonna get some mini-pretzels,” Rafael announces as Olivia unhooks the pump.

“I packed sandwiches,” she reminds him.

“I want pretzels,” he shrugs. “And coffee. You want anything?”

“Nah,” she says, keeping herself from pointing out that he’d just finished an entire thermos of coffee only an hour ago.

She stretches as the tank fills up and grimaces when she feels her joints cracking. She is _not_ looking forward to having to drive at least two more hours, no matter how good the company, and then -- _God, why did I agree to do this all in one day?_ \-- six hours straight back. This perp had better sing like a canary to make the drive worth it, she thinks as she pays for the gas.

“I can drive for a while,” Rafael offers, as if reading her mind. He’s got a plastic bag holding pretzels, candy bars, cashews, and (she notices with fond exasperation) a sandwich. In the other hand, of course, is his coffee.

“Are you sure?” she asks dubiously. She’s never seen him drive before, wasn’t even sure that he had a license, but she really could use a break. So when he nods with a smile she tosses him the keys, which promptly fall at his feet.

He shoots her a (mostly) playful glare and hands off the bag to her so he can pick them up. “Hey,” he protests when he sees her digging through it. “You said you didn’t want anything.”

“I didn’t know they had Milky Ways,” she says, unwrapping one.

“It’s a gas station in America, Liv, of course they have Milky Ways,” he grouses. “Don’t eat them all.”

She gives him a chocolatey grin and he rolls his eyes and walks around to the driver’s side. She climbs in too and settles in comfortably, thinking she might even try to take a nap.

Rafael starts the car and they head back to the highway. Olivia has just shut her eyes when the car _jerks_ forward -- “Jesus, Rafael,” she snaps as they speed onto the highway, “this isn’t the Indy 500.”

“I wanted to get in ahead of that truck,” he explains, nodding back, and she twists around to see an 18-wheeler so close behind that it could have easily plowed over them on the merge.

She decides to bite her tongue.

Until Rafael decides to merge again, merge across _three lanes at once_ to get into the fast lane. Olivia’s hand flies out to grip the dashboard and someone behind them lays on the horn.

Rafael rolls his eyes. “Some drivers,” he mutters contemptuously.

She stares at him. “ _Some drivers_? You just cut off about five different cars, you’re lucky they’re just honking.”

“I didn’t cut anyone off,” he denies, voice utterly lacking in concern. “Will you pass me a pretzel?”

“I think you should focus on the road,” she counters tersely. He gropes towards the bag and she jerks it away. “Can you please just focus! You’re tailgating this car,” she snaps, gesturing at a minivan so close in front of them she can see the peeling edges of the “Baby On Board” sticker.

“There’s plenty of room,” he complains, but to her relief he slows down to allow more space between the cars.

But he’s slowed down too much, and suddenly the 18-wheeler from before is bearing down on them, and it’s as all Olivia can do not to grab the wheel. “Okay, get out of the way, get into the slow lane!” she demands, too frazzled to care that she’s shouting.

“Calm down!” he barks back, merging approximately half a second after putting on the turn signal.

“Oh my god,” she groans, “pull over. Please, pull over.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll stay in the slow lane if that makes you feel better.”

“It would make me _feel better_ if you weren’t driving, Rafael.”

He shoots her a glare, a real one this time, and she nearly screams at him to get his eyes back on the road -- would have, maybe, except he’s actually listening to her and pulls off onto the highway’s wide shoulder.

“Do you seriously not want me to drive?” he demands, pushing the hazard lights button on with a violent jab of his thumb.

“Do you seriously call that _driving_?” she counters. “Get out.”

“Fine,” he snaps, and makes to slam the door behind him before realizing she needs to get in.

He refuses to look at her as they pass in front of the car, which is fine by her because she refuses to look at him either, and they both slam their doors after climbing in on their respective sides.

“Now you can have your pretzel,” she tells him snidely as she starts the car. Rafael folds his arms across his chest and glares out the window. “You’re not going to eat? Really?”

He ignores her.

“Alright, enjoy your hunger strike,” she drawls, and merges onto the highway with such perfect ease it puts a smug smile on her face.

“ _Everyone_ drives like me in the city,” he grumbles after a minute or so of silence.

She rolls her eyes. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re not _in_ the city. We’re on the highway going 70 miles an hour. You can’t just cut off a logging truck like it’s a yellow cab. Jesus.”

He stews in this for a little while. “I guess,” he admits finally. He glances at her, then begins to rummage through the bag. “Do you want the last Milky Way?”

“I thought you got three of them.”

“Yes, well, you ate one, and I’m going to eat one, and I’m offering you the last one,” he snips, but his voice is softer than before and she knows this is his stupid way of apologizing, so she nods.

“Can you unwrap it for me?”

“Sure,” he says, and they both chew in a much more relaxed silence.

“Pink Lady,” he remarks after several minutes have passed and he’s halfway through his first bag of pretzels.

“What?”

“You said you were a Pink Lady for Halloween. What else did you used to go as?”

Almost against her will she feels her face soften into a smile. “When I was little I used to like to go as a cat. I think that was three years in a row, a black cat.”

“Never a cop?”

“No, actually. What about you?”

“I definitely did _not_ go as a cop, not in my neighborhood.”

Olivia huffs out a laugh. “No, what _did_ you go as? In general.”

He shrugs. “Different every year. I remember one time when I was little I was an M&M. The red one.”

She laughs out loud. “That’s adorable. That would have been good for Noah, when he was younger. Now he has _very_ strong opinions about things like Halloween costumes.”

“Oh?” Rafael smirks.

“Oh yes, last year I suggested we do one of those cute matching costumes, you know, like a salt and pepper shaker, and he had a meltdown. ‘ _No_ , Mommy, I wanna be a _dinosaur_ _!_ ’” She shakes her head.

“He’s growing up fast, huh?” Rafael observes, watching her face.

She sighs. “He really is.”

“He’s a good kid,” he tells her with confidence. “And I’m sure he’ll spend his teenage Halloweens much better than I did.”

She peers at him curiously. “And how _did_ you spend your teenage Halloweens?”

He smirks. “That depends. Is there a statute of limitations on breaking into your friend’s uncle’s bodega?”

“I don’t know, you’re the lawyer,” she replies automatically, then catches up. “Wait. Did you _really_?”

“I can neither confirm nor deny. I was very drunk at the time.” He pauses (for show, she’s pretty sure). “Well, for part of the time. I was drunk after we stole a bottle of vodka and drank the entire thing between the three of us.”

She laughs out loud in surprise. “Is that why you only drink dark liquors now?”

He considers this. “Actually, I hadn’t thought of that. Probably.”

Olivia’s grin fades slightly as she thinks about what he’d said - _\- the three of us._ She’s pretty sure that meant him, Alex Muñoz, and Eddie García. But she doesn’t say anything, because he’s smiling and she doesn’t want to bring any bitterness to a memory that seems to have remained sweet for him.

“Well, I certainly _hope_ Noah is better behaved, then,” she agrees belatedly.

“It wasn’t so bad,” he says. “We didn’t _really_ break in. Alex had the key. And we didn’t take anything except the vodka and some cigarettes. And some candy. We thought we were _so_ slick, but looking back I’m sure his uncle knew and just didn’t say anything.”

“Lucky you.”

“Yes,” he sighs, leaning back in his seat. “Lucky me. If he’d called the police, that would have been the end of my Harvard scholarship right there. Can you imagine?” he muses. “I could be working at that bodega right now.”

“You would’ve found some other way to get your degree,” she says with the assurance of someone who knows they’re undeniably right.

“I guess I would have,” Rafael smiles. “How else would I have been able to make it to you?”

Her heart pounds _hard,_ once, twice, three times before it manages to settle back to something close to normal.

“You’d go so far just to show up and annoy me, huh Rafa?” she manages to joke.

“I’d say it’s you who does the annoying,” he argues with a smirk. “But yes, basically, I would.”

Olivia tries to find the right words. “I like that,” she finally settles for, and although it falls short of what she wants to say it’s true.

“Me too,” he says softly, and she knows without glancing over that he’s got that look on his face again.

She glances over anyway, just to see it again, and when she does he smiles at her. She smiles back, couldn’t help it if she wanted to, then swallows and faces the road again.

The radio is on low, playing some upbeat Beatles bop, and she becomes conscious of how _happy_ she feels. Self-conscious about it, even, because it’s almost too much, and she’s used to being “too much” in plenty of ways -- takes it as a point of pride, how she can overwhelm someone in the push towards the truth, towards what’s right -- but she’s not used to it like this.

She’s not even used to laughing so much, and she’s just starting to overthink it when she remembers that the same is true for him. When was the last time she heard him laugh, really laugh? Or smile so much and for so long? When had she _ever_ heard him sing? She has a sudden urge to take Rafael’s hand, to acknowledge _we’re in this together. We’re in this together but the “this” isn’t a fight, it’s a moment. It’s happiness._

She doesn’t take his hand, but she’s pretty sure he’s thinking the same thing. And that’s enough.

The next time Olivia looks over, he’s asleep. Head against the window, mouth slightly open, breathing soft and even, and she feels so tender towards him the thought of waking him up doesn’t even cross her mind. Instead she turns the radio volume down just a tick lower -- she still wants to listen, after all -- and focuses on the drive.

 

She pulls over for a break when they’re about half an hour from the prison. She wants to neaten up a bit; it’s hard to be intimidating or persuasive when you’re disheveled from a six-hour drive. She leaves Rafael in the car as she takes a brisk walk around the parking lot to stretch her legs, then returns to wake him.

“Hey, Rafa,” she says gently, leaning over the center console to shake his shoulder. “We’re almost there.”

He opens his eyes a crack. “Cariño, porque no me despertaste?” he asks groggily, then blinks quickly. “I -- sorry, I meant to say that in English.”

Olivia debates for just a second as to whether or not to tell him she understood every word, but he looks so nervous she decides not to. “And what did you say?”

He relaxes. “Just asking why you didn’t wake me up. How close are we?”

“About half an hour,” she answers as she sits back in her seat. _Cariño_ , she thinks, _cariño_ . She knows what it means -- “darling” -- but what could he mean by it? Really only one thing, she knows, but… well, she _wants_ it to mean that, and it’s a little scary. That’s all. He’s her best friend.

“Okay.” Rafael opens the door to stretch his own legs with a groan, then twists to pull down the sun visor and look in the mirror. “Ugh, what a mess,” he remarks, trying to coax back the once-perfect gelled coif that his nap had ruined.

“I’m sure our convict won’t judge you on a few stray hairs,” she reassures him, noticing not for the first time how handsome he is.

“I would, if I were him,” Rafael insists.

“You’d be a terrible convict.”

“I should hope so.” Having fixed the worst of it, he gives up on the hair and turns to face her. “Alright. Shall we?”

She grins for what feels like the millionth time today. “Let’s get the son of a bitch.”

And between the two of them they do, and on the long drive back she’s tired and it’s late and she gives him a sidelong look and considers a motel, but in the end she settles for taking his hand.

It’s the look on his face after the surprise that gets her, really. His eyes are wet and bright as he laces his fingers through hers, and he doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t need to.

She drives one-handed down the dark highway, and lets herself be happy.

**Author's Note:**

> This makes three of my four completed fics that end with hand-holding, fight me.
> 
> Eli helped me envision this as a fic where they tell each other things they've never told anyone else -- but not in a deep, tragic way; just sweet little things that no one has bothered to ask either of them about before. He also acted as my 1.0 consultant because I'm a fraud and still haven't seen it, but I trust his judgement when he says Liv totally would have gone as a Pink Lady. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope I captured their casual, easy intimacy, which is probably my favorite thing about their friendship and about Romantic Barson.


End file.
